The value of an innovative mechanism designed to resolve conflicts where indigenous peoples and local communities live in formally-listed protected areas will be explored in a workshop at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s World Conservation Congress next month.

Forest Peoples Programme will host Can Whakatane Conflict Resolution Processes Snowball to the Global? Resolving community/conservation conflicts at the event, being held in Hawai’I from 1-10 September.

The workshop will introduce delegates to the Whakatane Mechanism and its potential for resolving conflict between indigenous communities and conservation practitioners.

Developed from 2008, the Whakatane Mechanism brings people together to discuss the conflicts, facilitates a fact-finding mission in the field where the conflict is occurring, then brings people together to resolve the problem.

Drawing on experiences from sites where the mechanism has been implemented, it will particularly focus on the situation of the Sengwer, who continue to be evicted from Embobut forest, in western Kenya.

The workshop format is based on the Maori kanohi-ki-te-kanohi style, which will allow attendees to take to the stage. It aims to simulate a real-life situation where the Whakatane process is being implemented.

Using the experience of those attending, the workshop will work through the various problems and challenges that practitioners can expect to confront during the process, giving delegates a firmer, more practical understanding of the potential for this tool in the resolution of community and conservation conflicts.

The workshop will take place from 8.30am-10.30am on Saturday, September 3 , in room 318B.